The “Enskyment” series of photographs continues my engagement with life’s brevity as a way to appreciate the precious little time we do have.

The project involves a life-cast of my head, composed of sunflower seeds and gelatin. Upon it I train a camera that takes photographs in response to movement, documenting the reduction of the sculpture by birds – in effect, the conversion of matter to air.

The resulting photographs are edited minimally, or not at all. The camera is not very sophisticated, and has a quirk such that sometimes birds in motion are rendered in strange ways. I enjoy these odd artifacts that result from an imprecise process.

The title is borrowed from a Robinson Jeffer’s poem. Our body exists as an assembly of materials gathered from outside of ourselves. For me, these images prompt several questions. What happens when we imagine our body being dispersed back again? Is the barrier between our body and the rest of the world so clearly defined? Is willful submission to nature's processes in fact a chance at immortality? And perhaps most importantly: given that life is short, what should I be doing now?